Suicidal Empathy
Friedrich Nietzsche criticized empathy, suggesting that it can lead to vicarious suffering, where the compassionate person becomes emotionally burdened by the pain of others. He viewed this as a weakness rather than a virtue, arguing that it diminishes one’s strength and individuality.
Friedrich Nietzsche criticized compassion, arguing that it can lead to a shared suffering that makes the compassionate person “sick and melancholic.”
He believed that such virtues were overvalued and often used to manipulate or elevate oneself over others.
The ‘modern’ left is using ‘compassion’ to deceive everyone & to destroy civil society.
Has the European Union built its own propaganda machine?
According to journalist and analyst Thomas Fazi, the answer is yes.
In a new investigation, Fazi alleges that Brussels has constructed a vast system of influence spanning NGOs, media outlets, and universities—funded to the tune of billions of euros—to shape not only policy but public perception itself.
Fazi, a Rome-based journalist and author of The Battle for Europe (2014) and Reclaiming the State (2017), has closely analysed what he calls “The European Propaganda Machine”. His research paints a picture of a sprawling propaganda apparatus that can call on massive financial resources.The turning point, Fazi argues, came with the multi-annual financial framework for 2021–2027 and the introduction of the CERV programme (Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values), alongside programmes such as Horizon and Creative Europe. For the first time, the EU created a dedicated budget for promoting so-called “European values”.
The CERV programme alone amounts to over €2 billion over seven years—several hundred million annually directed towards civil society. Fazi describes this as a “communicative response to the growing discontent of the population after the financial and sovereign debt crisis.”
But is promoting civil society not a normal function of a democratic institution? Fazi sees a fundamental contradiction. “By definition, an NGO should be independent of political power and state or suprastate institutions,” he argues. “However, once these organisations are significantly dependent on funding from Brussels, their nature inevitably changes: they cease to be autonomous voices of civil society, and in fact become enlargements of the EU apparatus.”
His analysis of funded projects reveals that while some support undeniably meaningful initiatives—such as combating violence against children or gender-based violence—a significant proportion backs activities with a clear ideological orientation aligned with the liberal-progressive agenda of European elites on migration and gender issues.
Even more troubling, Fazi contends, is the money explicitly aimed at promoting the European Union itself, its security and defence policy, the dominant narrative on the Ukraine conflict, and combating Euroscepticism and nationalism.
“This is less support for civil society than a form of self-propaganda, financed by public funds that rewards conformist narratives and marginalises dissent,” he states.
Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of Fazi’s analysis is his claim that the EU engages in what amounts to election interference within member states.
“The European Union should not influence the internal debate of the Member States,” he argues. “It becomes particularly problematic when the Commission intervenes financially in countries governed by political forces at odds with the line of Brussels.”
“If the EU finances media and NGOs in such contexts, it actually represents a form of external interference. This approach is reminiscent of methods used for decades by U.S. agencies such as USAID or the National Endowment for Democracy—namely to fund local actors to delegitimise existing governments and promote the emergence of more adapted governments.”
Fazi points to specific examples. In Poland and Hungary—the two countries with the greatest tensions with Brussels—approximately €40 million has been allocated through the CERV programme since 2021.
He cites the statement of the president of a Polish NGO, the Res Publica Foundation, who explicitly acknowledged that EU-funded work contributed to the change of government in Warsaw in 2023.
“In the past, the EU exercised its influence ‘downstream’,” Fazi explains. “Regardless of the outcome of the election, European policies remained essentially untouched. Today, the intervention is increasingly ‘upstream’ by influencing electoral processes via financial levers—such as freezing or releasing EU funds—and instruments of information influencing.”
Fazi sees censorship and propaganda as two sides of the same coin. To control public debate, he argues, the European Union is increasingly resorting to instruments such as the Digital Services Act and initiatives like the Democracy Shield.
“The first comprehensive control attempts were made during the corona crisis,” he notes. “Today, the Commission regularly activates the so-called Rapid Response System, bundles control powers and transfers to selected fact-checkers the removal of content classified as ‘disinformation’—particularly before elections in ‘risk-taking’ countries. In many cases, however, it is not false news, but non-compliant political opinions.”
Fazi points to the Romanian presidential elections of 2025 as an exemplary case. The first round, in which an EU and NATO-critical candidate was ahead, was cancelled due to alleged disinformation campaigns on TikTok—campaigns that were never proven and which the platform itself denied.
Fazi’s research goes further, describing what he calls a veritable “European deep state”—a vast bureaucratic apparatus that can absorb even newly elected MEPs, who often lack the means to oppose it. “This system has similarities with the US, but takes an even more pronounced form in the EU—which is structurally less permeable to democratic control.”
Universities and research institutions have been drawn into this apparatus, Fazi claims. The academic world has undergone a profound change: from regular public funding to an almost exclusively project-based model. “This means that universities and researchers will only receive funding if their activities meet the priorities set out in calls.”
The Jean Monnet programme, which finances over 1,500 chairs worldwide, supports initiatives that explicitly aim to promote European integration, strengthen a common identity and counteract Euroscepticism. “As a result, the university—traditionally a place of critical reflection—runs the risk of becoming an instrument of legitimacy of the existing system.”
These instruments are also deployed outside the EU, particularly in candidate countries. Since 2022, more than €50 million has been allocated to media and academic institutions in Ukraine.
Despite Eurobarometer surveys showing broad support for European integration, Fazi urges caution. “The Eurobarometer is self-funded by the European Commission, which is why its data should be interpreted with caution.”
Election results across different countries tell a different story, showing significant growth of EU-critical forces.
Yet Fazi argues that propaganda has achieved a deeper, metapolitical effect. “Although many citizens are dissatisfied with individual policies, they increasingly perceive the EU as inevitable and barely surmountable. In reference to Mark Fisher, it is easier to imagine the end of the world today than the end of the European Union.”
New generations have grown up in this narrative. Individual technocrats or measures can be criticised, but the supranational structure remains taboo. “The propaganda has even tamed the opposition: no party seriously demands withdrawal from the EU or the euro, but at most a gentle ‘reform from within’,” Fazi observes.
Looking ahead, Fazi sees the supranational European model increasingly at odds with global developments. “In other regions of the world—from Asia to Latin America—forms of cooperation between sovereign states based on flexible and targeted agreements dominate. In my view, one should return to such a model, which is based on the cooperation of independent nations.”
Thomas Fazi will speak in Dublin at the Desmond Greaves Summer School on 11th September. His latest book, “The European Propaganda Machine: The Dark Side of NGOs, Media and Universities” (2026), is available now.